The Landlady
by Anne Llewlyn
Summary: My ending to Roald Dahl's The Landlady, done for an English assignment. Rated T, just to be safe.


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_**THE LANDLADY**_

Billy opened his mouth to say something, but the words died on his lips. Instead, he directed his gaze away from the landlady's round face and focused on the bottom of his empty teacup. Another stiff silence followed, accentuated by the occasional crackle of a fire that was burning much too loudly. At the sound of a chair creaking, Billy looked back up.

The old woman had glanced over her shoulder towards the clock that was ticking faithfully away on the mantle of the fireplace, and for that moment, her face was engulfed in darkness. When she turned back to face him, the corners of her mouth were pulled back in a soft smile, but it seemed that some of the shadow had stayed with her. Her gentle blue eyes had taken on a darker, much harsher hue, and the wrinkles on her brow looked a good bit deeper.

Billy blinked and shook himself internally. He swallowed hard, cringing slightly at the bitter taste that lingered on his tongue, but forced himself to speak anyway.

"You said that they - Mr. Mulholland, and Mr. Temple - were both still here, correct?"

She nodded.

"Though, I'm afraid, my dear," the landlady added, "That if you were planning on calling on either of them this evening, you'd best postpone your meeting till the morning. Of course," she paused, lowering the hand that held the teacup into her lap, and surveyed him thoughtfully, "You'll have more than plenty of time to get acquainted with them later." Her voice was quiet and soothing, almost as if she was trying to convince him of something.

Suddenly, Billy felt extremely exhausted, and instantly, a small part of him strongly suggested the option of resting. He rose to his feet before he knew what he was doing. "I suppose I should go to my room now, as well."

The landlady looked up at him approvingly. "Very well. Good night, Mister Weaver."

"And good night to you as well, madam."

He left the parlor and started to make his way towards the staircase. Beyond the ground floor, there was very little light. Passing the landlady's floor, Billy continued onto his, thoughts drifting to the fourth level, where Mr. Temple and Mulholland were occupying. A wave of curiosity washed over him and a small battle between his desire to explore the upper floor and his obedience broke out.

A nagging sort of feeling gripped at his stomach, originating with his natural sense of curiosity, but a voice in his head reminded him of the landlady; she'd advised against disturbing the other boarders this late into the night - a reasonable request, considering he knew neither of the two men beyond feeling familiar with their names.

He felt a cold draft coming down from somewhere upstairs, carrying with it a smell that reminded him very much of the old woman's scent; unusual, and implacable.

Almost as if on cue, he felt a frail hand grip his shoulder from behind.

Billy jumped, and clutched his heart - he hadn't heard her coming.

"Not still thinking about dropping in on Mr. Temple and Mr. Mulholland, are you, dear?" Her voice was unsurprisingly sweet as always, but her tone was biting - a sugarcoated accusation.

Regaining some composure, Billy avoided the question and managed to ask her what she was doing.

"Just checking on you and the two gentlemen. Now," she began, moving swiftly to block his path to the stairs leading upwards and ushered him down the hall, "Come this way; I'll escort you to your room."

Dazed and slightly embarrassed, Billy had no other option but to obey.

Starting to lose the feeling at the tips of his fingers and in his toes in what he wrote off as early signs of exhaustion, he gripped the doorknob gingerly and pulled it open. Keeping his footing light, he crossed into his room meekly and sat down on his bed. The landlady paused, trailing his movements with her eyes.

"Now then, I do believe what you need is a cup of tea before bed, alright, my dear?" It was more a statement than an offer.

"N-no thank you," Billy protested awkwardly despite her tone, "That's not necessary."

She remained resolute. "Really, I insist."

Billy bit his tongue, and nodded, signaling his submission. She turned around and made her way downstairs. Moments after she left, a cold, dreary kind of chill shot through his veins, and his entire body felt heavier. Unwilling to move, apart from turning his head to take in various elements of his temporary bedroom, he waited for her return in stiff silence. The quiet was broken by the sound of jangling silverware and clinking porcelain.

"Er... Please, come in," he invited, unsure of what else to say.

Obligingly, she entered, holding the silver tea set in her strange, peculiar way. She set it down on a small table, and fussed with the teapot. At length, she poured him a cup and held it out to him.

He took it hesitantly and took a sip, bracing himself for more unpleasantness. Even with his palate steeled, the taste of almonds was overwhelming. Not wanting to seem rude, he set his jaw in stone and downed the liquid, careful not to let his turmoil show.

A strange look resembling triumph flickered in the landlady's eyes briefly and the young man shuddered in spite of himself. Smiling, she started to speak again, but the sounds she produced seemed muffled, as if his ears were closing. For the whole duration of her speech, he did his best to focus on her voice, catching stray words every now and then, but when it seemed like she'd finished, he found himself short of breath.

Struggling to inhale, he felt his lungs collapse all too quickly, and his heart felt like it was being squeezed tighter and tighter by a vice. Billy fumbled, struggling to sit straight up, but discovered that his body refused to obey him. The teacup slipped from his shaking hands, probably breaking into a thousand pieces, but Billy couldn't zero in onto the shattering sound of its impact against the ground.

He looked at the old woman in desperation, but she glanced down on him, a look of amusement playing across her features. Smiling - always smiling. She opened her mouth and started talking again, seeming to know full well that he couldn't understand her.

Panicking, he could feel the weight of the Earth crushing his chest, forcing him down onto his bed, and his blood slowly turned to ice. His vision blurring, Billy's face contorted in pain as he tried to regain control of himself.

"My dear!" the old woman scolded loudly, her voice suddenly cutting through the thick cloud that was smothering him, "Didn't your mother ever tell you not to make such terrible faces? If you keep scowling, you'll be stuck like that."

He saw her take his hand into hers in the corner of his eye, as if trying to comfort him, but he felt nothing. No part of his skin responded to her touch.

"Don't fight, child," she cooed, "Just relax. Let go."

Insane. She was insane.

Billy tried to raise himself up, but the air was a thousand times heavier and thicker than it had been, and the remaining oxygen in his lungs gave out. Black spots dotted his vision, but he saw the landlady's mouth form the same two words again.

_"Let go."_

She'd done something to him and he was powerless to fight. He wanted to scream, to lash out, to run away, but his body was starting to shut down. His eyes, wild and flashing violently, met her blue ones, and a kind of numbness took over all his senses.

Lunatic.

Against his mind's pleading, his pulsed slowed. His eyes closed, and he was lost into darkness.

Witch.

He wanted to curse her, the land she walked, the air she breathed, but realized she'd never given him her name.

Freak.

He thought of Temple and Mulholland, and how she had described them to him. '_Mr. Mulholland was also seventeen_,' she'd said, "_Mr. Temple...was a little older. He was actually twenty-eight_."

'Was.'

Murderer.

Her voice rang in his ears again, and he wasn't sure if it was the landlady speaking, or if he was remembering her words. Something deep in his mind clicked, and an indescribable feeling of clarity and calmness flooded his entire being.

_"Let go."_

And Billy did.

He found it was sweet relief to surrender.

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**Author's note:**

**So... This is my response to Roald Dahl's _The Landlady, _which we read in English class. As an assignment, our teacher asked us to come up with our own versions of how it ended, and after much inner turmoil, this is my (needlessly elaborate) interpretation of the finale.**

**...Ta-da...?**

**Considering that the minimum length was only 250 words, I really went overboard, didn't I...**

***nervous laugh***

**Hopefully, though, I didn't deviate completely from Dahl's style in writing this. I have a tendency to, let's say, delve too deep into trivial things and overlook major issues. Which is pretty much the opposite of the original style : wonderfully phrased and just clear enough to give you a taste of what's happening. **

**In short, thrilling. The perfect way of telling this kind of story.**

**Seriously. You should have seen me in class while we were reading it individually. I was the image of hysteria: hyperventilating and on the verge of falling out of my chair. (Correction: I did eventually crash into the ground. At the ending.)**

**Everyone got a good laugh out of that one. Even the teacher.**

**But anyway. I got a wide array of vibes coming from _The Landlady_, what with the taxidermist-slash-landlady, the mysterious Mr. Temple and Mulholland, and the strange tasting tea, and I probably could have gone a lot of different ways with wrapping it up. But despite all that, I ended up going the obvious route, i.e. killing Billy, slowly and painfully.**

**So there you have it: my unimaginative and painfully drawn-out English assignment.**

**(The longer I think, the less confident I feel about presenting it to everyone on Tuesday.)**

**Well, in any case, thanks for reading!**


End file.
